Letters to the Editor

I second almost everything Dr. Gerald S. Coles writes in his letter
rebutting claims that attention-deficit-hyperactivity disorder, or
A.D.H.D., is of biological origin ("Attention-Deficit Research: 'Leaps
of Faith,' Not Logic,'' Letters, May 19, 1993). But why does he find it
necessary to criticize the use of the term "disorder'' in referring to
the symptom clusters making up this condition?

A.D.H. (with or without the second d) exists; that it may be most
parsimoniously explained as a function of psychological, or
environmental, factors, regardless of the contribution or even mere
association of biological variables, does not affect its status as a
disorder. Does Dr. Coles know something I ought to find out before
testifying in an upcoming court case on behalf of a patient in whose
diagnosis of A.D.H.D. by others I concur?

I, too, see no reason to ascribe biological origins to this
patient's disorder. If perhaps most authorities, excepting Dr. Coles
(and, putting customary modesty aside, myself) do regard the A.D.H.D.
diagnosis as biological in origin, that does not preclude us dissenters
from recognizing it as a disorder, does it? The Diagnostic and
Statistical Manual (D.S.M.-III-R) nowhere requires this assumption.
That others may insist on the assumption is a wholly gratuitous "leap
of faith'' that they may have to live with, but Dr. Coles and I do
not.

By the way, I have ordered Dr. Coles's book, The Learning Mystique:
A Critical Look at "Learning Disabilities.'' I suspect he has written
the book I've always wanted to--except for the quotes around the
learning-disabled condition. (I am afraid to say disorder, at least
until I read the book.)

John M. Throne
Senior Scientist
Institute of Life Span Studies
University of Kansas
Lawrence, Kan.

To the Editor:

Your readers ought not to be misled by Lee Mitgang's lengthy and
ingenuous letter in your June 2, 1993, issue ("'Setting the Record
Straight' on Carnegie Data for Study of Choice,'' Letters), which seeks
to repudiate points I made in an interview in the May 5, 1993, issue
("Monograph's Author Critiques Carnegie Study on Choice,'' Focus
On).

Owing to space limitations, what I had to say in summarizing a
monograph with 11 sections, 75 footnotes, and extensive bibliography
was reduced in your publication to under 500 words. Mr. Mitgang knows
very well (though your readers who have not read it could not) that the
points I made briefly in the interview are elucidated fully in the
monograph (Carnegie received a copy) and nullify his attempted
criticisms.

To give a few examples:

1) Mr. Mitgang asserts that Carnegie's contention that one-third of
Arizona parents chose schools for academic reasons is a direct
reference to an Arizona March 1992 survey. This is true as far as it
goes. What it leaves out, and what my monograph demonstrates, is that
the figure is meaningless because 37 percent of those included in the
poll did not respond meaningfully. The true percentage of those who
chose schools for academic reasons, therefore, was over 60 percent, and
the author of the Arizona report, Richard Gallagher, explicitly
confirmed this interpretation. It is interesting that Mr. Mitgang
persists in citing this statistic, in that, under fire after including
it in its widely publicized draft report, Carnegie dropped the chart in
question altogether in its final report.

2) Mr. Mitgang claims that the Carnegie report had already gone to
print when Arizona's new and dramatically increased numbers for
participation in schools of choice were published. The Arizona report
was published in October 1992. The Carnegie final report was published
in December of that year, and it included dozens of changes from its
draft report released in October, such as that cited above, not to
mention a whole new chapter, "Seeking Common Ground,'' which my
monograph applauded. It could also have included the accurate numbers
for Arizona, up 35 percent from the previous year.

3) As to Minnesota, Joe Nathan of the Humphrey Institute has already
published an extensive analysis of Carnegie's shortcomings in that
state. He found 64 errors in the chapter on statewide choice (including
Minnesota) alone, the most significant being that the true number of
students participating in choice programs in Minnesota was five to
seven times greater than Carnegie concedes.

Although the information was left out of the interview, my monograph
did say that Carnegie noted a U.S. Education Department survey that
found 55 percent of Minnesota choice parents cited learning climate as
the reason for switching schools and went on to say that "the Carnegie
report simply dismisses the [department's] data by citing many unnamed
'Minnesota school administrators [who] disagree.''' If Carnegie wants
to come forward with a list of these administrators that is
statistically significant and contradicts the Education Department
survey, we will welcome the data.

4) Mr. Mitgang argues that the eccentrically worded Carnegie poll
questions are superior to those several dozen others with different
wording that have yielded radically more favorable responses to choice.
These are described and analyzed in detail in the monograph, and
polling experts are cited to contradict Carnegie's position.

5) Mr. Mitgang also claims that Carnegie referred to a
representative spectrum of research on the link between choice and
improved academic performance and found none. This claim is repudiated
in the monograph, in which nearly a dozen studies demonstrating the
link are cited. Importantly, the co-author (Lauren Sosniak) of a paper
cited by Carnegie as disproving such a link specifically repudiates
Carnegie's interpretation. Furthermore, and most unfortunately, the
monograph documents instances where the Carnegie report was not only
guilty of errors of omission and interpretation but even quoted one
official as making a statement that he vehemently denies.

I will not go on ad nauseam. Like Mr. Mitgang, I share a desire to
see every school become a school worth choosing and take no pleasure in
being implicitly identified by him as a "warring camp.''

I can only recommend to those readers who would like to judge for
themselves that they obtain a copy of the monograph, "Beyond Partisan
Politics,'' free of charge from the Center for Social Thought, 37 West
20th St., Suite 902, New York, N.Y. 10011; (212) 255-4210.

James MacGuire
Senior Fellow
Center for Social Thought
New York, N.Y.

To the Editor:

Buried in Bruno Manno's piece, "Clinton's 100 Days in Education''
(Commentary, May 12, 1993), is the snide criticism of President Clinton
for returning, after 12 years of Reagan-Bush deviance, to the
time-tested American policy of confining tax support to public
schools.

What Mr. Manno wants, apparently, is tax support for private,
predominantly sectarian schools not under meaningful public control,
which are not required to play by the same democratic rules as our
public schools.

We should be thankful that we at last have a President who values
public education and our constitutional principle of separation of
church and state, who refuses to be seduced by the siren song of those
who would wreck public education, balkanize our society along religious
and other lines, and cater to the undemocratic demands of selfish
sectarian special interests.

As one who has served for more than 20 years in a categorical
program serving migrant students, I am amazed that taxpayers and others
who have an interest in the effectiveness of schools have not realized
that our resources are being squandered because of the "time locked''
attitude of the educational system. This time-locked mentality dictates
that no matter how many more so-called supplementary, federal, state,
or local funds are directed to the schools, these funds are generally
to be expended between 8 A.M. and 3 P.M. on a Monday-through-Friday
basis.

Although many of these funds are labeled as "supplementary,''
educators insist upon investing the funds during the same time frame
that has already been paid for, thereby providing sometimes different
rather than additional services to the target students.

Aside from the wasteful practice of layering resources during the
same time period and supplanting services, the student is cheated by
not receiving more time to excel by experiencing different activities
which are "above and beyond'' the basic services.

As a consultant to the Chicago public schools at the time, I was
amazed that something so blatantly a piece of insider graft could be
foisted on the unfortunate children of Chicago. The name "Mastery
Learning'' was attached to a set of locally organized reading materials
and sold to the schools by insiders/employees/officials. Anyone knowing
anything about the mastery-learning principles would spot the fraud
immediately. The mastery-learning group at the University of Chicago
disavowed any connection with the project. This example of commercial
exploitation of the name of an educational movement was reported in
Education Week at the time of the controversy.

In the future, some clarity may be gained by identifying this
regrettable canard as the "Chicago pseudo-mastery-learning masquerade''
and avoiding its use in discussions of true implementations of mastery
learning. Professor Veatch's personal and professional opinions aside,
discussions of mastery learning should be necessarily limited to true
examples of mastery learning.

In this case, the rose was not a rose--it was more like skunk
cabbage.

Lyelle L. Palmer
Professor and Chairman
Department of Special Education
Winona State University
Winona, Minn.

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